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Re: 1990 Film: "Total Transportation", Southern Pacific Marketing is essential in truly competitive markets.....
Author: Sgt. Joe Friday
Date: 03-17-2023 - 10:44
The "parallel lines" BOB2 mentions divesting would have meant that UP could keep the Donner Pass line or the Feather River line, but not both.
Santa Fe was interested in acquiring the WP in the early 1960s, much to the dismay of SP. IIRC, SP started buying up WP stock in an attempt to block the acquisition. Around the same time, WP was making a play for GM's business at their Bay Area assembly plants, which SP also opposed, and eventually managed to kill by planting enough seeds of doubt with GM about WP's ability to perform ("Western Pacific can't afford GM").
A BN-WP merger would have made sense for shippers. It would have created a parallel, competing east-west line between Chicago and the Bay Area, as well as a competing through north to south line from Puget Sound to the Bay Area.
Santa Fe was interested in acquiring the WP in the early 1960s, much to the dismay of SP. IIRC, SP started buying up WP stock in an attempt to block the acquisition. Around the same time, WP was making a play for GM's business at their Bay Area assembly plants, which SP also opposed, and eventually managed to kill by planting enough seeds of doubt with GM about WP's ability to perform ("Western Pacific can't afford GM").
A BN-WP merger would have made sense for shippers. It would have created a parallel, competing east-west line between Chicago and the Bay Area, as well as a competing through north to south line from Puget Sound to the Bay Area.
